What Is A Credit Report?
A credit report is a collection of data related to your credit history, including borrowing, repayment, delinquencies, defaults, and bankruptcy. The information on your credit report allows potential creditors and lenders to evaluate your ability to repay any credit or loans they might provide you with.
It basically shows how much outstanding credit you currently have, how often you use that credit, and how well you repay your credit. Additional information on your credit report will include previous inquiries made by other parties, public records from any government sources, and relevant personal information, such as your social security number, previous names, addresses, and employers.
Three Major Credit Bureaus
Credit reports are issued primarily by three major credit bureaus. Whenever you apply for a credit card or loan, the potential lender will check your credit history with one or more of these independent credit bureaus.
The three major credit bureaus are:
Equifax
P.O. Box 740241
Atlanta, GA 30374
1-800-685-1111
Experian
P.O. Box 2002
Allen, TX 75013
1-888-397-3742
TransUnion
P.O. Box 1000
Chester, PA 19022
1-800-888-4213
It is a good practice to find out which bureau a potential lender uses for checking your credit and then get a copy of your credit report for that bureau before you apply. This allows you to check for any potential problems that may be on your credit report and start clearing those up prior to applying for a credit card or loan.
How To Get A Free Credit Report
Ever since the passing of the Fair and Accurate Credit Transactions Act of 2003, also known as FACTA, consumers have been entitled to one free copy of their credit report once every 12 months. If you want additional reports within that timeframe, you will have to pay for them. The FTC recommends the following website for obtaining a free credit report from one or all of the major credit bureaus:
One thing to watch out for is the great number of companies that will offer you a free copy of your credit report . . . with a catch. They will provide you with the report, but you will have signed up for a free trial of their credit monitoring service. It will be up to you to cancel the free trial within the given time period or it will start billing you. If you always use the website recommended by the FTC, you can avoid the costs of these unnecessary "free credit report" / credit monitoring services.
It should be noted that while you can get a free copy of your credit report once per year, you don't get your FICO credit score along with that. That is a separate piece of information that you will always have to pay for. Once you've obtained your credit report, and possibly your credit score, you can then Apply For A Credit Card with a pretty good idea whether or not your application will be approved.